20130320_seoulbeats_se7en32013 has been quite the year for breaking news. If you need a refresher on some of the most shocking current events that occurred just this year alone, check out our most recent roundtable in which we talked about 2013’s most intriguing news stories for the first half of the year. I understand that this poll comes at the heels of the K-pop world’s most recent outbreak — that of Se7en and Sangchu‘s late night romp — which makes it easy for all of us to become prisoners of the moment, but please do consider all the big news stories that happened throughout the first half of the year, and think — which one will be the most talked about still at the end of the year?What’s the biggest news story — the one that caught your attention the most — so far this year?

A couple of things will be different from previous polls. Firstly, notice that there is no list of nominees to choose from below because we want the nominees to come directly from you! Secondly, we will dedicate a special midyear post to highlight the winning entry.

Here’s how it works:

1) Nominate an entry in the comments section. This is by far the most open-ended midyear poll, so please try your best to stick to this format for the sake of clarity.

Persons Involved – Short description of scandal

Eg. Baek Ji-young – Miscarriage

Brevity is key. Use as few words as possible in getting across your description or summary of the event.

2) Entries can only be made as a new comment. Entries made in reply to another comment will not be counted.

3) Before nominating a new entry, please thoroughly check to make sure that the entry has not already been nominated (this is where it helps to be brief in your description). Duplicate entries will not be counted twice! Therefore, it would be counterproductive to nominate an entry more than once because it could potentially split up the overall votes for that entry.

4) Once an entry has been nominated, vote by clicking the up arrow beneath the comment which nominates the entry. We’re only concerned about up votes; down votes will not be factored in.

5) The entry with the most up votes by July 1st 11:59 PM EST will be declared the winner! Check back next week for our special midyear post dedicated to the winning entry.

We reserve the right to delete any comment which does not adhere to the rules above, or any entries which we do not feel meet the poll’s criteria.

Important Note — Discussion is highly welcomed in our polls. However, please separate discussion comments from entry comments. When nominating an entry, do not write your reason for nominating it in the same comment. Instead, reply to your entry comment if you want to explain why you nominated your entry.

This is your last chance to vote! If you’ve missed any of our prior midyear polls, make sure to check them out. Some may still be open for voting. Look forward to our midyear specials which are written in dedication to the winner of each poll!

This poll is now closed. Thank you for voting!